After experimenting with a lot of different thief specs, and trying to find one that works for me (As well as experimenting with dungeons in the new Mad Realm area) I've begun to learn the importance of blind - coupled with evasion - in upper level content. I can't simply expect to faceroll everything and not expect a lot of punishment in return.

So, after doing a lot of thinking about different theories and so forth, I've come up with this idea for a dual pistol and shortbow build. The idea focuses around the best ways to introduce blindness - as opposed to Haste - the go-to tool for my Sword/Pistol build.

What I've come up with so far is something like this

Healing Skill: Hide in Shadows, or Signet of Malice

Utilities: Signet of Agility
Signet of Shadows
Smoke Screen

Elite: Thieves' Guild

Any suggestions or recommendations? I haven't heard a lot about dual pistols - so I'm curious to see how they measure up to other weapon sets.

I'm not sure about traits - I'm thinking of working in some Trickery and Critical Strikes - But that still leaves a third tree... Perhaps Shadow Arts or Acrobatics? I'd be shorting myself some power, but since I'm shooting for insane critical damage it shouldn't matter. Again - any thoughts?

Hello,
P/p and sb is my default weapon set and based from my experience you don't need smoke screen because you are already in range kiting in range is easy plus you already have skill 5 from p/p that provides 5 attacks of blindness.

I started with 20/30/0/20/0 then later switched to 15/20/0/20/15 since anet doesn't provide us with dps meter i have no idea if my dps got worse or better. but p/p weapon set is very initiative hungry as most of your damage will come from unload.. p/p is somewhat a boring set but easy to play and i feel a very effective weapon set. i can fire off 5 unload in my current setup before i go to skill 1. bec of my current trait build. I traited for signets and the generic 15 trait for trickery.

I really wished anet would put a dps meter so people can gauge themselves if they are doing okay in terms of damage atleast.

For trait i guess it will really depends on what you want, the only thing i want from deadly arts was suddering strikes. but since p/p's condition damage will come from skill 1 and 2 i don't think traiting or gearing for condition is a good thing. i seldom use skill 2 of p/p bec i feel the initiative cost is not worth it for its damage.. ill rather hope that my sundering strikes proc.

As for skill 4 if you can time it well its a nice utility.

As for skill 5 its good to perma blind a single mob which doesnt casts ground spells as skill 5 has a combo field that forces you to stand in the field or have to fire through it so your attack will blind your target.

P/P power would be centered around spamming 3 with signet of malice providing healing. I can't recommend shadow refuge enough for a well organized group. It's great for skipping trash, healing up through the life steal (shoot through it for life steal), and just generally being an awesome utility.

As for traits, I'm afraid I'm not of much use. I run a crit strikes + shadow arts build and don't really do P/P. I would say 25/30/0/0/15 since the pistols afford enough survivability through range and blindness that you should be able to get away with a pure DPS trait setup.

I run P/P a lot and the build that I like the most is this.http://gw2skills.net...5IyxmjLHZODCmZA
I've done all explorer modes with it and think of it as the most versatile pistol build you'll get.
Second weapon set would be SB or S/P. Gear wise I use full berserker and a knight/soldier mix - the build is quite durable if you add some hp & toughness, but of course just as often you want the raw damage of full berserker.
Some traits are interchangeable but the main idea is to stack might with sigil of strength & unload (works like a charm) and through dodges and to buff might duration through runes of strength (and getting a nice 5% more damage 100% of the time). fluid strikes add a +10% damage as long as endurance isn't full, which it rarely is. Note that i completely ignore condition damage - but the occasional auto attack bleed gets buffed through might as well.
Signet of malice provides 800 healing per unload on 80 as an additional benefit.
Quick recovery & opportunist provide the needed initiative boost to spam unload some more, while 15 starting initiative & 3 initative on steal support that.
I use Signet of agility, roll for initiative & shadow refuge like 90% of the time, but just use what suits you best. Only signet of malice is mandatory I'd say.

I run P/P a lot and the build that I like the most is this.http://gw2skills.net...5IyxmjLHZODCmZA
I've done all explorer modes with it and think of it as the most versatile pistol build you'll get.
Second weapon set would be SB or S/P. Gear wise I use full berserker and a knight/soldier mix - the build is quite durable if you add some hp & toughness, but of course just as often you want the raw damage of full berserker.
Some traits are interchangeable but the main idea is to stack might with sigil of strength & unload (works like a charm) and through dodges and to buff might duration through runes of strength (and getting a nice 5% more damage 100% of the time). fluid strikes add a +10% damage as long as endurance isn't full, which it rarely is. Note that i completely ignore condition damage - but the occasional auto attack bleed gets buffed through might as well.
Signet of malice provides 800 healing per unload on 80 as an additional benefit.
Quick recovery & opportunist provide the needed initiative boost to spam unload some more, while 15 starting initiative & 3 initative on steal support that.
I use Signet of agility, roll for initiative & shadow refuge like 90% of the time, but just use what suits you best. Only signet of malice is mandatory I'd say.

I have a similar build with you right now, just curious why pick the 3 extra trait in the acrobatics line (+1500 hp) over (+150 power), i know feline grace is a nice trait i do miss it from time to time especially in dodge heavy fights but i feel that +150 power is a better trade off over +1500 hp, plus the +150 power will buff all your damage including skill 1.. i know +1500 hp at times is a big boost but so is +150 power.

I know p/p's main damage will come from unload thus loading in initiative refill skill feels some what a must but don't forget the unload needs power over crit, bec power is not based on chance and is constant all the time the higher the power the higher the crit aswell.

Feline grace is both, great on fights with lots of dodges & another stack of might on fights without the need to dodge - i just do it in between unloads. But I don't just invest more points in acrobatics for feline grace alone.
Thief base initiative regeneration is roughly 6 initiative per 10 seconds. Quick Recovery adds 2 initiative per 10 seconds meaning roughly one third with just one trait. As P/P damage is not only defined by power but also through initiative (unlike lets say S/P, that has a beefy auto attack, we can't just fall back on that). So that is what quick recovery is for. With just 5 points left, Fluid Strikes is the only thing to put your points in. You'll either dodge to get might stacks, or you just have to dodge. Either way, your endurance will almost never be full, so you get 10% more damage. The synergy between Fluid Strikes & might on dodge is simply great.
Also, 10% more damage is better than 150 power, so I've kind of neglected those.
Apart from 150 additional vitality, Acrobatics also provides boon duration, so my might stacks last even longer, which again boosts my damage.

15 points in deadly arts on the other hand are just not that appealing. The minor traits are either bad (poison on steal) or bad for P/P (weakness on poison - great for D/X & shortbow, useless for the rest). Sundering strikes is quite good, and buffs group-damage, but it just isn't as good as Quick recovery. The second stat is condition duration. Now, condition duration would be good for auto attack, but 15% doesn't give you another bleed tick, so it does nothing for P/P except adding ~ 0.5 seconds on sundering strikes procs.

Of course my build isn't the only viable P/P build, not at all, but I'd say, as soon as you put points in acrobatics, you should really put 25 in it for maximum benefits. I'd also say that the whole might theme only makes sense if you actually buff might (through runes & boon duration).
If you want a more conservative (meaning DD only, not much to manage) approach, I'd probably spec 25/30/0/015. That way you have less initiative regeneration - and more auto attack, but you also buffed your auto attack by adding another bleed tick. You lack the might synergy, but you can simply "avoid" that all together by using ruby orbs or divinity runes (or eagle runes) instead of runes of strength.
This build lacks the tankiness I described above though, but when you look for damage, you probably aren't looking for hidden survivability .

Feline grace is both, great on fights with lots of dodges & another stack of might on fights without the need to dodge - i just do it in between unloads. But I don't just invest more points in acrobatics for feline grace alone.
Thief base initiative regeneration is roughly 6 initiative per 10 seconds. Quick Recovery adds 2 initiative per 10 seconds meaning roughly one third with just one trait. As P/P damage is not only defined by power but also through initiative (unlike lets say S/P, that has a beefy auto attack, we can't just fall back on that). So that is what quick recovery is for. With just 5 points left, Fluid Strikes is the only thing to put your points in. You'll either dodge to get might stacks, or you just have to dodge. Either way, your endurance will almost never be full, so you get 10% more damage. The synergy between Fluid Strikes & might on dodge is simply great.
Also, 10% more damage is better than 150 power, so I've kind of neglected those.
Apart from 150 additional vitality, Acrobatics also provides boon duration, so my might stacks last even longer, which again boosts my damage.

15 points in deadly arts on the other hand are just not that appealing. The minor traits are either bad (poison on steal) or bad for P/P (weakness on poison - great for D/X & shortbow, useless for the rest). Sundering strikes is quite good, and buffs group-damage, but it just isn't as good as Quick recovery. The second stat is condition duration. Now, condition duration would be good for auto attack, but 15% doesn't give you another bleed tick, so it does nothing for P/P except adding ~ 0.5 seconds on sundering strikes procs.

Of course my build isn't the only viable P/P build, not at all, but I'd say, as soon as you put points in acrobatics, you should really put 25 in it for maximum benefits. I'd also say that the whole might theme only makes sense if you actually buff might (through runes & boon duration).
If you want a more conservative (meaning DD only, not much to manage) approach, I'd probably spec 25/30/0/015. That way you have less initiative regeneration - and more auto attack, but you also buffed your auto attack by adding another bleed tick. You lack the might synergy, but you can simply "avoid" that all together by using ruby orbs or divinity runes (or eagle runes) instead of runes of strength.
This build lacks the tankiness I described above though, but when you look for damage, you probably aren't looking for hidden survivability .

Great point on the initiative regen and boon duration i really miss them right now, maybe i'll try something different later on. i seldom use quick recovery before, when i had 20 traits in acrobat i was using assasin's reward for more survivability.

What do you think about 10/25/0/20/15 or 10/20/0/25/15 trait build ? i really feel that sundering strikes is just too good not to pick especially in p/p setup spamming unloads gives sundering strikes really a very very high proc rate thus increasing your dps and the entire group aswell.